With the advent of AIDS and other highly infectious diseases, syringes and scalpels and other sharp devices have caused numerous injuries and infections to the administering medical staff. Legislation has been enacted, including California (State of California Labor Code .sctn.144.7(d)) requiring some type of protection to the medical staff.
Protective devices have been proposed, but these devices have been scattered and non-functional and are not user-friendly. For example, a nurse must use two hands to prepare a patient for an injection. One hand is used to clean the area to be injected with a disinfectant while the other hand is used to inject the needle into the tissue. After removing the needle from the patient, the administering nurse must press on to the spot of injection and hold the syringe in the other hand. After pressing the spot of injection is completed (to stop the flow of blood), the nurse, in prior protective devices, then uses that hand to twist a cover over the syringe or sharp That requires two hands during which time the needle may drip blood onto the patient or the nurse where contamination is inevitable. In addition, the maneuvering to accomplish the foregoing may cause an inadvertent puncturing of the nurse's own skin, thus inviting infection. One such device requiring a two-handed operation is Badger U.S. Pat. No. 5,885,257, which is a very cumbersome releasable retaining device to retract the needle syringe where it will not cause harm.